Meet our expert: Tracy Wilson, Olympic Figure Skater, Broadcaster & Third Factor Sport Advisor

Tracy Wilson how to support someone after failure?
Tracy Wilson is an Olympic bronze medallist and one of Canada’s most respected figure skating coaches and broadcasters. Alongside her late partner Rob McCall, she won seven consecutive national titles and made history as the first Canadian ice dancers to reach the Olympic podium. Following her competitive career, Tracy coached world-class athletes including Olympic champions Yuzuru Hanyu and Javier Fernández, and became a trusted voice for audiences on CBC, NBC, and TSN. As a member of the Third Factor Sport Advisory Board, she brings invaluable perspective on the mindset and methods that help athletes thrive under pressure.

“How do you support someone after failure, especially when the stakes are high and the moment has already passed?”

Knowing how to support someone after failure is one of the hardest things a coach, leader, or mentor has to do. There is no rewind button. The moment has passed, the result is set, and the person in front of you is somewhere between devastated and numb. What do you do?

At the recent Third Factor Client Appreciation Dinner in Toronto, Tracy Wilson was asked how she handles an athlete who has just fallen apart in a big moment. Her answer was honest, grounded in decades of experience in high-performance sport, and it applies just as much in the boardroom as it does on the ice.

Here are six principles drawn from that conversation.

01. There is no one right way to respond

The first thing Tracy will tell you is that there is no script for this. Knowing how to support someone after failure starts with understanding who is in front of you and where they are emotionally before doing or saying anything else.

She acknowledges the complexity directly: “It does depend on the athlete. And at my age, watching what I’ve watched, sometimes these big failures can turn you around and get you going in a better direction. You learn things about yourself. If you can hang in there, it can shoot you right up.”

But she is equally clear-eyed about how difficult it is to communicate that truth in the moment. The insight that failure can become fuel is real, it just can’t always be delivered right away. The job isn’t to rush in with a lesson. It’s to figure out what this person needs, right now.

02. Be present

In the immediate aftermath of a big failure, Tracy’s instinct is not to talk, it’s to listen. Or simply to be there.

“So then it’s really hearing them out. Asking questions, or actually being okay just to sit. And sometimes I have moments where you’re sitting with somebody and it is super uncomfortable, and you’re just focusing on your breath, because you just want to be there. You just want to be a calm presence.”

That phrase, “a calm presence” is worth pausing on. The temptation for coaches, leaders, and mentors is to fill silence with solutions. But in the immediate wake of failure, what most people need is not a fix. They need to feel that someone is with them in it.

03. Help them find what else is true

Once the initial storm has passed, people often start telling themselves a catastrophic story: it’s over, I blew it, I’ll never recover. Tracy’s most consistent move is to gently challenge that narrative. Failure has a way of narrowing our vision, and part of a coach’s or leader’s job is to widen it again.

She pointed to a specific example: someone close to her who failed a major school medical exam by a single point and was convinced his path to medicine was over. Tracy’s role was to help him find a more complete picture of reality.
“It was just trying to help somebody find the truth, because oftentimes it’s exaggerated. When they said to themselves, “This is the worst thing. I can never do this now. It’s over.” And all I am really helping them find is what else is true.”

That simple question, “what else is true?” doesn’t dismiss the failure or minimize the pain. It creates a little space around the story, space where possibility can re-enter. It helps them remember what else is true about themselves: “I am knowledgeable. I am tenacious. I really care about this. I work really hard.” It works just as well in a performance review debrief as it does rinkside.

04. Use hindsight and your own failures

One of Tracy’s most effective tools is perspective: using the person’s own past, and her own.

“The other thing I try to remind them of is hindsight. Have you seen this completely different in the past? And then I try to use examples of past failures I’ve had.”
There is something disarming about a coach or leader who has failed. It signals that failure is not disqualifying but part of the path. When Tracy draws on her own failings, she is not being humble. She is demonstrating that high performance and setback co-exist in every serious career – in sport and in business alike.

05. Help break the spin

After a setback, people tend to replay it over and over. That loop can be hard to break. For anyone caught in that circular thinking, Tracy often recommends something simple.

“Sometimes journalling helps, just to sort of write it down. For me, that would get the spinning out.”

The goal isn’t deep reflection or insight, it’s simply to externalize what’s churning internally so it stops consuming all available bandwidth. For leaders supporting a team member after a setback, even encouraging someone to write down what happened can be enough to shift them out of the spiral.

06. Hold the belief for them

Ultimately, Tracy’s message to anyone supporting someone after failure is one of belief in their resilience, even when they can’t access it themselves.

“You’re stronger than you know. Hang in there, and you’re gonna get to the good stuff.”

Alongside that: question the negativity. Ask whether the catastrophic narrative is actually true. Ask what else is true. Hold both. And when the person in front of you can’t find their own footing yet, your job is to stand on solid ground for them.

 

 

Key Takeaways:

  • There is no script. How to support someone after failure depends on who they are and where they are in the moment. Read the person before reaching for the playbook.
  • Presence over prescription. In the immediate aftermath of failure, a calm, quiet presence is often more valuable than advice. Being comfortable sitting in discomfort is a leadership skill.
  • Ask “what else is true?” Failure narrows vision. The role of a coach or leader is to gently widen it again – not by dismissing the pain, but by creating space for a more complete picture.
  • Draw on your own failures. When leaders and coaches share their own setbacks, they signal that failure is survivable and that the path forward is real.
  • Help break the spin. Writing things down can interrupt the circular thinking that often follows a high-stakes failure.
  • Hold the belief for them. Sometimes people can’t access their own resilience. That’s when a coach or leader holds it for them, until they can hold it themselves.